The master movie riffers of Cinematic Titanic re-animate the flatlined celluloid corpse of FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS, a 1974 mash-up of horror genres and characters served Italian style. Rossano Brazzi, of SOUTH PACIFIC fame and not much else, plays Count Frankenstein, a bossy, love-starved aristocrat who gives brain transplants to the local population of prehistoric cavemen. Why, we'll never know and likely never care!
The Cinematic Titans — Joel Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu, Frank Conniff, Mary Jo Pehl and J. Elvis Weinstein — dissect this monstrous mess with their razor-sharp wits, charging up a torrential storm of puns, pop culture references and punchlines. The film leaves itself wide open for comedic attack with its stilted acting, horrible voice dubbing and generally uninspired production value. CASTLE OF FREAKS gives a bad name to the Italian Sexploitation Horror genre, which is truly a feat worthy of shame. You'd never sit through this film without the Titans riffing rapid-fire jokes at its expense, and they alone are a great reason to watch this terrible tale and laugh yourself into an early grave (to be robbed later).
FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS will never make for some enchanted evening of movie entertainment, but the CT crew make this fright of the living lame enjoyable for lovers of Mystery Science Theater-style humor.
It's goodbye Rogers and Hammerstein, hello dwarves and Neanderthals for Rossano Brazzi in this dismemberment of Mary Shelley's classic horror novel. Other than his monster-making laboratory in the castle basement — which as you can see on the right also doubles as the fruit preserves cellar — this stuffy Count Frankenstein (not to be confused with Dr. Dracula) spends most of his time dressing up, pouring drinks and delivering long speeches about experiments he never actually performs. Subtract all the corpse-stitching horror, add pages of dull exposition and throw in a few scenes of gratuitous semi-nudity and you get this clumsy costume drama.
It's even a bit sadder to see actor Michael Dunn trapped in this flake-enstein failure, given his previously successful track record appearing in 1960s-70s projects like THE WILD, WILD WEST (as Dr. Loveless) and STAR TREK, following his 1963 Tony nomination. Dunn's dwarf character Genz is verbally and physically abused by the Count, peeps on bathing women, and eventually befriends the cavemen to exact his revenge upon the Frankenstein family. Sadly but perhaps fortunately, Dunn never saw this crappy creature feature stagger into US theaters.
Inexplicably, FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS bears no resemblance to the film's original title in Italian, which loosely translates to TERROR! THE CASTLE OF THE CURSED WOMEN. Perhaps the non-reference to Frankenstein was enough to avoid a lawsuit, but the curse definitely applies to the unfortunate actresses cast solely for their sex appeal value. From milk baths to skinny dips in a mineral spring, it's doubtful such shameless exploitation lured audiences into theaters. For this reason, the Titans inaugurate the Breast Blimp, a small silhouetted dirigible that occasionally drifts in front of the movie as glimpses of nudity occur to maintain the PG-13 spirit of their send-up.
With the original film offering viewers so little entertainment, the CT crew steams ahead full speed with their cargo of riffed punchlines, pop culture references and hilarious cinematic criticism. When the Count's hunchback assistant surprises one of the castle's female guest, it's an "Abe Vigoda-gram!" Mary Jo follows up on the girl's horrified (and horribly dubbed) reaction with, "She's so scared, she threw herself out of sync." And as the brain-transplanted caveman attacks his maker, his close-up inspires the gag, "It's like Clint Howard and Gentle Ben had a kid and he's choking me!" Other pop entertainment jokes join the fun, from Joel singing Minnie Ripperton's Lovin' You to Trace urging director Joel Schumacher to "ease up on the ass shots!" In a nod back to MST3K days, Trace stops the film halfway through to set the record straight how this crappy ripoff is ruining Mary Shelley's original novel. But when his lecture has the Titans questioning why Trace likes Frankenstein but not Frank, the moment of clarity and justice is lost in silly silhouetted squabbling.
This DVD presentation with silhouetted Titans maintains the movie's original 1.66:1 full-screen ratio, which will leave letterbox black stripes at the sides when viewed on a 16x9 widescreen television. This is probably just as well considering the video transfer of CASTLE OF FREAKS is quite mediocre with pixelation evident along horizontal and diagonal lines in the image. It's no fault of the Cinematic Titans, as their superimposed silhouettes look sharp in crisp black over the film itself. Given the low production value and age of the movie subject, the video quality is watchable which is enough to have some laughs with CT. The film's sound quality is quite good even if the English voice dubbing is continually, often humorously out of sync. It's very easy to hear both the movie and the Titans' comedic comments over it in CT's standard Dolby Digital 2.0 audio mix.
While I missed seeing the Titans' faces while they riff, as was possible in the live DVD for DANGER ON TIKI ISLAND, the comedy value remains just as high. FilmEdge gives FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS only 3.5 stars due to the poorly made film the Titans must overcome with their jokes. You'll enjoy just as many laughs with Cinematic Titanic here as with their other DVD releases, and several of their gags chart near the top of CT's best work. FilmEdge recommends you get your FREAK on!
(3.5 stars)
Inexplicably, FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS bears no resemblance to the film's original title in Italian, which loosely translates to TERROR! THE CASTLE OF THE CURSED WOMEN. Perhaps the non-reference to Frankenstein was enough to avoid a lawsuit, but the curse definitely applies to the unfortunate actresses cast solely for their sex appeal value. From milk baths to skinny dips in a mineral spring, it's doubtful such shameless exploitation lured audiences into theaters. For this reason, the Titans inaugurate the Breast Blimp, a small silhouetted dirigible that occasionally drifts in front of the movie as glimpses of nudity occur to maintain the PG-13 spirit of their send-up.